In its new era, Chanel wants shoppers to look beyond bags

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Celebrities and clients arrived Tuesday afternoon to an empty Manhattan subway station in black SUVs, dodging puddles that threatened to destroy their Chanel slingback heels. The gritty Lower East Side underground location was a surprising choice for Chanel’s first New York fashion show in seven years, even if the Bowery station’s out-of-service platform is often used as a film set and doesn’t have a pizza rat in sight.

The setting signaled a re-energized chapter at Chanel, under the creative direction of newly appointed 41-year-old Matthieu Blazy. Blazy’s arrival in April has given the brand “an incredible halo effect" and its business is “better than ever," Bruno Pavlovsky, president of Chanel fashion, said in an interview on Monday, the day before the runway show. Blazy’s collection showcased jeans and quarter-zip sweaters alongside sequined dresses.

Pavlovsky said clothes like these would be more prominently integrated at Chanel’s boutiques, where quilted leather handbags have long been the key draw. Before the first of two showings began, Tilda Swinton floated gracefully through the crowd in a feathery Chanel top, causing Condé Nast chief content officer Anna Wintour to note wryly that Swinton looked “great for the rain." Jon Bon Jovi, bundled up in a black turtleneck and combat boots, smiled politely for photographers. Seated patiently on one of the show’s low benches, the fashion designer Dapper Dan wore a sequined three piece suit he said he’d made as a homage to the late Karl Lagerfeld.

Christine Baranski, currently starring in “The Gilded Age," said navigating the subway stairs had her slipping out of her Chanel heels. “I thought, ‘Ooooh, OK. And then when do we get to the